"God and Satan alike are essentially human figures, the one a projection of ourselves, the other of our enemies."
Read quote
17 likes
Quote collection
Bertrand Russell quotes (page 10 of 60)
1.2K quotes — follow a thought to its full quote page.
"The essence of the liberal outlook lies not in what opinions are held, but in how they are held; instead of being held dogmatically, they are held tentatively, and with a consciousness that new evidence may at any moment lead to their abandonment."
Read quote
17 likes
"What has human happiness to do with morals? The object of morals is not to make people happy."
Read quote
17 likes
"If throughout your life you abstain from murder, theft, fornication, perjury, blasphemy, and disrespect toward your parents, church, and your king, you are conventionally held to deserve moral admiration even if you have never done a single kind, generous or useful action. This very inadequate notion of virtue is an outcome of taboo morality, and has done untold harm."
Read quote
17 likes
"Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion go hand in hand."
Read quote
17 likes
"If you think your belief is based upon reason, you will support it by argument rather than by persecution, and will abandon it if the argument goes against you. But if your belief is based upon faith, you will realize that argument is useless, and will therefore resort to force either in the form of persecution or by stunting or distorting the minds of the young in what is called 'education.'"
Read quote
17 likes
"To realize the unimportance of time is the gate to wisdom."
Read quote
16 likes
"Organized people are just too lazy to look for things"
Read quote
16 likes
"A great many worries can be diminished by realizing the unimportance of the matter which is causing anxiety."
Read quote
16 likes
"Your writing is never as good as you hoped; but never as bad as you feared."
Read quote
16 likes
"We all have a tendency to think that the world must conform to our prejudices. The opposite view involves some effort of thought, and most people would die sooner than think in fact they do so."
Read quote
16 likes
"What the world needs is not dogma but an attitude of scientific inquiry combined with a belief that the torture of millions is not desirable, whether inflicted by Stalin or by a Deity imagined in the likeness of the believer"
Read quote
16 likes
"In democratic countries, the most important private organizations are economic. Unlike secret societies, they are able to exercise their terrorism without illegality, since they do not threaten to kill their enemies, but only to starve them."
Read quote
16 likes
"Science may set limits to knowledge, but should not set limits to imagination."
Read quote
16 likes
"Science tells us what we can know but what we can know is little and if we forget how much we cannot know we become insensitive of many things of very great importance. Theology, on the other hand induces a dogmatic belief that we have knowledge where in fact we have ignorance and by doing so generates a kind of impertinent insolence towards the universe. Uncertainty in the presence of vivid hopes and fears is painful, but must be endured if we wish to live without the support of comforting fairy tales."
Read quote
16 likes
"The social psychologist of the future will have a number of classes of school children on whom they will try different methods of producing an unshakable conviction that snow is black. When the technique has been perfected, every government that has been in charge of education for more than one generation will be able to control its subjects securely without the need of armies or policemen."
Read quote
16 likes
"The world that we must seek is a world in which the creative spirit is alive, in which life is an adventure full of joy and hope, based rather upon the impulse to construct than upon the desire to retain what we possess or to seize what is possessed by others."
Read quote
16 likes
"There is something feeble, and a little contemptible, about a man who cannot face the perils of life without the help of comfortable myths. Almost inevitably some part of him is aware that they are myths and that he believes them only because they are comforting. But he dare not face this thought, and he therefore cannot carry his own reflection to any logical conclusion."
Read quote
16 likes
"The man who is unhappy will, as a rule, adopt an unhappy creed, while the man who is happy will adopt a happy creed; each may attribute his happiness or unhappiness to his beliefs, while the real causation is the other way round."
Read quote
16 likes
"The teacher, like the artist, the philosopher, and the man of letters, can only perform his work adequately if he feels himself to be an individual directed by an inner creative impulse, not dominated and fettered by an outside authority."
Read quote
16 likes